


A Steady Squall

by lady_mab



Category: Friends at the Table (Podcast)
Genre: F/F, Gen, Pirates
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-08-31
Updated: 2019-08-31
Packaged: 2020-10-04 03:43:43
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,875
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20464460
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lady_mab/pseuds/lady_mab
Summary: The small life boat rocks on the surface of the choppy waves. A lesser sailor would be seasick, but Hella is no lesser sailor.She is Hella Varal, Captain of the—Well, Captain of nothing now.Hella is no lesser sailor, and the unsteady waves don't bother her, but the loss of her ship and crew are enough to make her stomach churn like the slate grey waves that dragged it to pieces.





	A Steady Squall

**Author's Note:**

  * For [imperialhare](https://archiveofourown.org/users/imperialhare/gifts).

> Stay clear of the wreckage  
She goes down, down, down  
\- ["beneath the brine" by the family crest](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ywIgQBnBndI)

The small life boat rocks on the surface of the choppy waves. A lesser sailor would be seasick, but Hella is no lesser sailor.

She is Hella Varal, Captain of the— 

Well, Captain of nothing now.

Hella is no lesser sailor, and the unsteady waves don't bother her, but the loss of her ship and crew are enough to make her stomach churn like the slate grey waves that dragged it to pieces.

She lies on her back, curled into an uncomfortable position between the benches. Her sword is at her side, the gentle murmur of the waves pressed into her ear. And she watches the foreign stars swirl above her as she drifts in the endless expanse of an unfamiliar sea.

* * *

It's easy to lose track of time when the only thing to count it is the rising and the setting of the sun, then the rising and setting of the stars.

There's no sign of the storm that took her boat from her. There's no sign of land.

She identified north the first night the skies were clear enough, but a lot of good it did when she also identified how far off-course she had been blown.

One oar, a few supplies, not nearly enough water. Her sword.

No ship.

A single wave slaps playfully at the side of her lifeboat.

"Fuck you," she tells it, and hopes her message will be carried to whatever capricious spirit manages the storms.

* * *

Her water is almost gone by the time she realizes that the currents are carrying her in an unnatural direction.

If Hella read her maps correctly (and she doesn't doubt that she did), then the currents in this area should be guiding her westward. Further away from the known world, to the edge of the map.

She doubted her eyes at first when she read the stars the night before. East, and south.

Not quite the direction she had been going, and she doesn't know if it is comforting or not.

This time, when a wave slaps at the side of her boat—deliberate, almost—she doesn't say anything.

* * *

A massive shadow lurks beneath her boat when she wakes up the next day.

It's far enough below the surface that she can't make out the details. She can barely make out the scope of it, as it seems to stretch from one edge of the horizon to the other. But there are edges to it. Hazy and indistinct.

Hella almost laughs. Her water isn't gone _yet_, she shouldn't be seeing things. The sun has been getting to her, perhaps.

"This is how I die. A giant whale." Her voice rasps against her throat, and she has to resist the urge to lick her lips.

Her brain spins tired theories—she is at the other edge of the map, blown completely over the side. _There be monsters_. Unknown territory, uncharted waters.

Normally, the thought would excite her, but now, it only makes her disappointed.

_Under any other circumstances_.

She wonders if she can swim down to it, and learn the shape of the beast. She wonders about its lung capacity, because it hasn't crested the waves for air. She wonders if it has an entire nation on its back, and that, once she dies, she will sink down into its waiting embrace.

"Soon enough," Hella promises it, and pats the bottom of her boat as if to reassure the beast far below.

Maybe it's just her imagination, but it sounds like something taps back with the same rhythm of promise.

* * *

Hella runs out of water.

She made it last as long as she could, but even she couldn't hope to survive off of how little had been stored on the boat.

A part of her knows: _A captain should go down with her ship_.

But when the captain loses her ship and is given a lifeboat instead, one with water and food for a short journey, the captain tends to cling to that life as long as she can.

The despair finally starts to set in. Knowing that it will be a painfully drawn out death. Her sword is not even a temptation. It remains sheathed at the bottom of the boat.

The massive shadow still lurks beneath her boat. Maybe now is the time to indulge in the notion of trying to swim down to it.

Hella props her chin on the side of the lifeboat, and watches the waves urge her forward. The currents have maintained a steady pace, but without knowing where she is, or where the closest landfall is, she can't hold onto any more hope now that her water is gone.

She reaches over the edge of the boat, studying the way her reflection traces the imagined outline of the whale. Studying the shadowed curves of it, finding its edges.

It's exhausting.

Her arm drops, and her fingers dip into the water.

And, in one heart-stopping moment, a hand grasps hers back.

Hella yelps as she rears back as if burned—hands pinwheeling to keep her balance. She hits the other side of the boat with tremendous force, carried on unsteady legs.

It's enough to send the boat rocking, and she scrambles to catch her footing.

There is a terrifyingly tense moment where she's afraid the little boat will capsize (no water be _damned_, she'll go her own way!), but a gentle wave steadies her.

Laughter bubbles up in the surf, and when Hella looks, the shadow of the giant whale is gone.

There is no trace of it anywhere. Something that huge couldn't just _disappear_.

Hella grips the edge of her lifeboat, heart pounding, breath rasping in her lungs, knuckles white. Her eyes scan the horizon, unable to find any sign of it.

"I'm sorry," a woman laughs, "I did not mean to startle you."

Hella whirls around, dropping to the bottom of the boat to grab her sword. "Show yourself, Siren."

The voice continues to laugh, and the water around the boat bubbles. And then the laughter takes shape, the ocean foam curling into a woman's figure. "Not quite a siren," she says, though the outline doesn't have lips yet.

Water flows down her torso like a dress, but her arms are bare. Her skin darkens, from translucent blue, to the shadowy depths, to a dark brown—sunkissed and smooth. Her ears are sharp like fins on a fish, and her smile is sharp like a shark's.

"My cousin was ready to lay claim to you," she says without context. The woman holds out a hand, and a single, perfect pearl lays cupped in the bowl of her palm. "I was not so quick to give up one of my own."

"Your own…?" Hella asks, dizzily. She lets the woman take her hand and slip the pearl into her own palm without fighting. "Who are you?"

Her eyes, pale and oddly reflective in the harsh light, flicker a bit in disappointment. "You don't have a guess?"

"I don't believe in gods."

She grins at this, delighted. "And yet here I am."

"A sea witch."

"A nymph, a siren, a mermaid, an illusion. Whatever you wish to call me, Hella Varal, I insist that you at least use my name to my face."

Hella hesitates, and slips the pearl away into the pouch on her belt. "Severea, right?"

And like the sea calming after a storm, the goddess' posture relaxes, and the water that forms her dress slows to a gentle current. "There. That wasn't so hard, was it?"

"What do you want from me?" Hella is tired, dehydrated, and a hand's breadth away from death by exposure. She doesn't have time for this. The pearl weighs heavy in her pouch, pulling at her attention. "That was you, before, I guess?"

"An aspect of mine, yes. I am the pulse of the waves, and the creatures that dwell within the depths. I've been trying to watch over you."

Hella turns away, stares out over the horizon and the distinct lack of any sign of land. "Are you going to apologize?"

There's a beat, and no answer is forthcoming, so Hella carries on.

"A storm destroyed my ship. Took my crew. You must have felt them slip through your fingers, if you're all that you say you are."

"I do not apologize for acts of nature," Severea says softly, and Hella scoffs. "Do you give thanks for each fish you take from my waters? Do you asks ants for forgiveness when you step on them? Do not make me so monstrous when these are things you do not do yourself."

Hella decides not to respond to that, keeping her gaze averted.

Severea sighs with all the impatience of an immortal woman. "I am here for a purpose, Hella Varal. Will you listen?"

"I have nowhere else to be, so yeah, I guess." She sneaks a glance out of the corner of her eye, only to find that the expression has not shifted from Severea's face. The water lapping at the sides of her boat sounds like laughter, though, so she counts it as a victory.

"I am looking for a champion," Severea says, and that wipes the smirk off of Hella's face.

"A champion?" She thinks of Hadrian, of his devotion.

"Yes."

"And you want _me_?"

"Ideally, yes."

Hella wonders at that. She's never been devoted to anything but her ship and the ocean.

Severea waits.

She wonders again. "What would that entail?"

The goddess glances from Hella to the lifeboat. "A ship, for starters. You would need a vessel worthy of flying my flag."

Hella frowns. "A ship costs money, and I'll be lucky to make it to the shore alive." _No thanks to you_ goes unsaid, because perhaps she doesn't apologize to the ants she steps on, and she doesn't give thanks for fish she catches.

Perhaps people who do not give the goddess due recompense are not among those she grieves.

Severea does a very mortal roll of her eyes. "I have wrecked many ships in my day, yours notwithstanding. Some with more purpose than others. Gold is not a problem."

Hella holds out her hands to indicate the salt water around her. "Dehydration is."

"You doubt my powers?"

"I hold a reasonable amount of suspicion for attractive women making enticing offers."

Severea throws her head back and laughs, delighted. "Would you like a demonstration then, of what I am capable of?"

Hella weighs the choices in her head, and figures that, if she dies in the process, well it wouldn't have mattered much anyway. "You're not going to make me swear loyalty first?"

The goddess' grin is sharp and toothy. Her fingers curl like vicious hooks over the side of the boat as she hoists herself further out of the water, revealing a sinewy torso covered in scales. "I know you will accept, so I don't consider this a waste."

She reaches out, and Hella grabs her sword hilt on instinct. But Severea's laugh sounds like a storm, and her fingers sting like lashing rain as she grips the back of Hella's head.

"Breathe deep, and hold tight," she croons, and with a mighty thrash of her tail, the goddess pulls Hella beneath the waves.

**Author's Note:**

> I wrote this for Linda back in May, and then I keep forgetting to post it, so what better reason than to post this on Linda's birthday???


End file.
